296 Lucerne. 



bage ; they are also eaten after being baked in hot ashes. 

 The natives of the South-Sea Islands bestow great pains on 

 the culture of this root, by inundating the land at one time, 

 and draining it dry at others, by means of ditches dug round 

 the fields. Thus, says Phillips, we have another instance ot 

 the importance attached to the same plant, in one part of the 

 world, which in others are utterly despised, and deemed by 

 the illiterate, almost a curse to the land. It is little used in 

 modern medical practice, though formerly highly extolled by 

 the old medical writers. 



* Oh I wander not where Dragon Arnm showers 

 Her baneful dews, and twines her purple flowers, 

 Lest round thy neck she throw her snaring arai 

 Sap thy life's blood, and riot on thy charms 

 Her shining berry as the ruby bright, 

 Might please thy taste, and tempt thy eager sight ; 

 Trust not this specious veil; beneath its guise, 

 In honied streams a fatal poison lies. 



So Vice allures with Virtue's pleasing song, 

 And charms her victims with a siren's tongue." 



Lucerne. 



This plant is in the class Diadelphia, order Decandria. Its 

 characters are : — Keel deflexed from banner ; legume spiral, 

 compressed. Specific characters : — Peduncles racemed ; le- 

 gumes loosely spirally twisted ; stipules entire ; leaflets obo- 

 vate, oblong toothed. This is an agricultural perennial, bear- 

 ing a blue colored flower in June and July. It is a native of 

 the East, but naturalized in the United States. The generic 

 name appears to come from the place of which it is a native, 

 as it is said to have been carried to Greece during the expedi- 

 tion of Darius. Lucerne occupies the same ground for a long 

 time, but when it forsakes it, it is forever. On this account, 

 says Tyas, it has been made the emblem of Life. Nothing 

 is more charming than a field of Lucerne in full flower. It 



